


Basement

by whosrickygoldsworth



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: Gen, I love Jane, Jack and Jane braid hair and talk about boys, Jack has a kid now and her name is Jane Ross, Jack summarizes Shakespeare and Jane makes snarky comments, What else are you supposed to do in a basement, vague descriptions of injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-03-11
Packaged: 2019-11-15 09:00:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18070403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whosrickygoldsworth/pseuds/whosrickygoldsworth
Summary: Jack and Phryne get close to cracking a case. Naturally, the killer doesn't like that one bit and locks Jack and Jane in a basement. While waiting for Phryne, Jack has to keep Jane entertained.





	Basement

Senior Detective Inspector Jack Robinson could handle being kidnapped. Generally it meant he was getting somewhere with the case. So he pondered the details, trying to figure out who was sending thugs to visit him in this less-than-appealing basement. He took note of his injuries. A pounding headache and a painful twinge in his left shoulder. And standing up might be a poor idea at the moment. He wasn't too worried. If he couldn't take a beating, he wouldn't have been passed his cadet ship. And then the thugs tossed in a fifteen year old girl with mussed up plaits and a torn skirt. Inspector Robinson could see her chest moving up and down, but her eyes were closed. He pulled her into his lap, willing her to wake up. He knew the poor girl in his arms.

Jane Ross opened her eyes and looked around in alarm. The dreary room offered no clues as to her location. “Where am I?” she asked, wriggling out of his arms.

“It's Inspector Robinson, Jane. I don't know where we are, but I suspect it has something to do with a case I was working on with Miss Fisher. Regardless, I suspect the best thing to do at the moment would be to bide our time and try to gather information,” he said, keeping his voice calm and authoritative for the young girl's sake.

The young girl nodded. “Won't Miss Phryne be worried?” she asked.

“Oh, she will be. Give her some time and she will be breaking down the door,” Jack replied. “And she will be furious with whoever threw us in here, but she will be even more furious with me if I let any harm come to you. Are you alright?” Jane wrapped her arms around him and under his coat. He returned the embrace, rubbing the back of the girl's head.

“He hurt me,” Jane responded, her voice muffled by the inspector's chest. “I tried to use what Miss Phryne taught me, really, and I got a couple hits in, but he was bigger and I,” she trailed off.

“I've got you now,” he said. “I'll keep you safe.” He pulled her closer to him, as if he could hug away all the girl's troubles. He could feel his shirt getting wet. But he couldn't care less. He didn't know if he'd get to arrest the thugs holding him or if Phryne would tear them apart first. If she did, well, he wouldn't arrest her. He might hold her handbag while she did it, though.

He leaned against the wall, the young girl still carefully nestled in his arms. He returned to running over the details in his case. The body was Alexander Wilson, a man neck-deep in organized crime and killed by a hard blow to his head. His criminal empire was inherited by a man named James Taylor, who had been seen with a woman from a brothel at the time of the murder. His material assets were inherited by his wife, Eleanor, who was far too pregnant to have murdered anyone and preoccupied with raising 3 other children, the oldest of which was 7. As he left the Wilsons' home, the 4 year old boy had tugged on his sleeve and said he saw the murderer. He wouldn't say who it was, but he had used male pronouns. Jack had thanked the boy and watched him run back to his mother. If he had a 4 year old son, he wouldn't want his son witnessing a murder.

Nor would he want his fifteen year old daughter to cling, hurt, to some detective inspector locked in a basement.

He looked once more for an escape route he knew wasn't there. Jane was still whimpering into his shirt, and he tried to catalog the contents of his coat. Matches, a notebook, some cards with his information on them, nothing that could get them out of here. The thugs had seen fit to relieve him of his firearm fairly quickly, and even his folding knife had been taken from him.

Chance of escape seemed slim. But Miss Fisher was undoubtedly aware of the situation and fighting towards them. If the murderer had kidnapped him because he was too close, Jane must be being used as ransom to get Miss Fisher to either give the murderer enough money to leave Australia or drop the case. He allowed himself the luxury of thinking about Miss Fisher and not the situation at hand. He hoped she hadn't worried herself to near-hysteria. Of course, she had Collins and Miss Williams. He hoped he'd trained Collins well enough that the young man could work in his absence. But Collins was certain to be shaken, and he often bumbled around when dealing with another person's emotions. And Miss Williams would be concerned about her miss, but she would be all aflutter about Jane's disappearance as well. _Please, Phryne, breathe. I know you can figure this out. Just breathe_ , he pleaded mentally.

“Inspector?” Jane asked.

“Yes, Jane?” he said, using the same voice that he used for meeting with a victim's loved ones.

“Will you tell me a story?”

“Of course. Have you done much Shakespeare in school yet, Jane?”

“We've covered _Macbeth_ , _Romeo and Juliet_ , and some sonnets,” the girl answered.

“Well, would you like to hear the plot of _Much Ado about Nothing_?” he asked.

“Yes please,” she answered, snuggling further into him. He smiled softly. Before, she had practically tunneled into him, desperate for comfort and protection. Now, she was much happier.

“The play starts at the home of Leonato. He is preparing to welcome Don Pedro and his whole army into his home. And I don't even think your Aunt Prudence is capable of that.” Jane giggled. “Leonato greets them with his daughter, Hero, and his niece, Beatrice. I think Miss Fisher would get on well with Beatrice. Witty and fiercely independent.”

“Were you describing Beatrice or Miss Phryne?” Jane asked cheerfully.

“Both, Janey. Anyways, Beatrice immediately starts bickering with some of the soldiers, particularly Benedick. Benedick is best friends with his fellow soldier Claudio, who has fallen desperately in love with Beatrice's cousin and Leonato's daughter Hero. But he bumbles around a bit, and Don Pedro has to woo Hero disguised as Claudio.”

“And she couldn't tell?”

“It was late, he was wearing a particularly unattractive mask, and they'd only just met.”

“Particularly unattractive?” Jane asked.

“Yes, well, Shakespeare made a special note of it. At this point, it is revealed that Don Pedro has a half-brother Don John. Don John absolutely hates his brother. And since Don Pedro helped Claudio win over Hero, Don John resolves to ruin the couple's happiness.”

“How?”

“Well, you know how easy it is for Shakespeare characters to confuse each other's identities. One of Don John's lackeys stands in Hero's window with one of her ladies in waiting, while Don John leads his brother and Claudio to the garden below where they can see. Don Pedro and Claudio immediately resolve to embarrass Hero at the altar.”

“Instead of talking it out?”

“Do you know how many of Shakespeare's plays would have ended differently if people used basic communication skills?”

“Fair point, Inspector,” Jane said, her tone reminding Jack of her ward's.

“In the lead up to the wedding, the cast of the play decides to convince Beatrice and Benedick to get together. They do so by spreading rumors that the two are besotted with each other, but too scared of rejection to say anything.”

Jane mumbled something that loosely resembled, “Remind you of anyone?”

He didn't comment.

“Beatrice and Benedick each decide that courting the other would not be quite as bad as they have been pretending it would be. At Hero's wedding, when Claudio accuses his fiancee of adultery, Beatrice immediately defends her cousin. Benedick says that Don John must have manipulated his brother and Claudio, but offers to fight against Claudio for Hero's honor regardless. Leonato tells Claudio that Hero died of shock, and a group of coppers tells Claudio that they heard Don John ordering his cronies to frame Hero. Claudio is utterly struck by grief.”  
“Wonder why that would be. Might be because his accusations ruined a girl's life,” Jane said. Jack fought back a smile. Jane was definitely Miss Fisher's daughter.

“Leonato says that his niece looks just like Hero, and that if Claudio is truly remorseful, he will marry his niece in Hero's place. Claudio agrees, but said niece is truly Hero. At the end of the play, they hold a double wedding and everyone lives happily ever after.”

“Hero doesn't actually address the fact that her husband accused her of adultery?”

“I think Benedick got a couple punches in, if that makes you feel better,” Jack answered.

“It does,” Jane answered, nodding into his chest. “Will you tell me stories of you and Miss Phryne's adventures?”

“No. You'll either be terrified or get ideas that will terrify me,” Jack said firmly.

Jane leaned away from his chest with the force of her laughter. Then her hair got in her mouth and she started desperately pulled her hair away from her face.

“Turn around. I'll braid your hair,” Jack suggested. She nodded and turned around. He combed through the child's dark blonde hair and began sectioning it off. His shoulder twinged again at the movement of his arm, but Jane was smiling lightly. He wrapped the plaits around her head into a crown. He had a niece, Lizzie, and he adored braiding her hair, even if the eight year old couldn't stay still. The fifteen year old sitting between his legs was far better at staying still.

Hmm. If she could stay still, perhaps she wasn't Miss Fisher's exact replica after all. Lord knows Miss Fisher had never managed to stay still.

“All done,” he announced, although it wasn't as if she could stand up and bounce over to a mirror to see his handiwork.

“Thank you,” she answered. She returned to his side and was quiet for a moment. “Inspector, do boys ever grow up?”

“Let me put it this way. There's a reason fathers worry so much over their daughters, and it's because they haven't taught their sons that women should be treated like human beings. Why, do you have a boy at school giving you problems?”

“My school's all girls, Inspector.”

“Smart choice. At the very least, girls are more subtle in their put-downs. Still, do I need to drag someone into the station for questioning?” His arm tightened around her.

“There's a boys' school not far from mine. They held a dance. This boy Peter invited me to go. Miss Phryne even took me to that salon she likes so I could get a pretty blue dress.”

“I'm sure you looked beautiful,” Jack said, worried about where this was headed.

“But he told me that asking me out, flirting with me, all of it was his idea of a lark,” Jane told him, looking into her lap.

“Oh, darling, I'm sorry,” Jack said, the endearment slipping out without a second thought.

“I had to call Bert and Cec to pick me up,” Jane said. “All the other girls went to after-parties and slept over at each others houses, and I was going to go, but after all that, I just wasn't in the mood to go. Miss Phryne made cocoa because Dot was out with Constable Collins. And she got out some biscuits she said came from your secret stash.”

“My secret stash?”

“You make good cookies, Inspector.”

“Thank you. Tell you what, when we get out of here, I'll teach you the secret family recipe. But you can't tell Miss Fisher, understood? She's been haranguing me for it since she found out it existed. It'll have to be our little secret.”

Jane nodded seriously. “Yes, Detective Inspector.”

He feigned seriousness, even though he could feel a smirk forming. “You realize that this is a very important secret that Miss Fisher will try to pry out of you?”

“Miss Phryne will not know under any circumstances, Inspector. I swear.”

“Jane! Jack!” they heard a familiar female voice calling.

“Miss Fisher! Inspector!” called Collins, echoed almost immediately by Miss Williams.

“Over here!” Jack yelled. He could hear Phryne's heels hit the stairs and the door to their prison was flung open.

“Jane! Jack!” she greeted.

“Jane, can you stand up?” Jack said, realizing he had never cataloged the girl's injuries.

“I think so,” Jane answered, taking Miss Fisher's outstretched hands and standing up next to her guardian. Jack followed her lead, although he had to lean against the wall once his leg began protesting. He gestured for Collins to come over, but Phryne draped his arm over her shoulder before Collins could.

“Thank you, Phryne,” he whispered. She smiled at him and they made their way into the sun.

That night, they sat in her parlor. He swirled his whiskey in his hand as he lounged on her daffodil-colored chaise.

“I've been made aware of some egregious crimes, and after quite some contemplation, I think I've finally figured out who the culprit is. Although you would have taken much less time to solve the same mystery, I suspect.”

“I got Taylor to confess to sending a man to do the deed. He hasn't coughed up the name of the assassin yet. I suspect he's worried about being thrown in for much larger crimes than just one murder and kidnapping. You know that,” Phryne said, a bit of confusion clear in her face.

“Not that. I have recently noticed biscuits going missing from my office. I thought I'd just eaten them and not remembered it. After all, no one would be foolish enough to steal from a police station, much less the office of a Senior Detective Inspector. But you would love the thrill, wouldn't you?” he said.

“What will you do about it, Inspector?” the thief asked, looking up at him through her thick eyelashes. “What evidence do you have to support your accusations?”

“Oh, Miss Fisher. I'll get a confession out of you yet.”

 


End file.
